Emigration 4.a
Sunday, April 3
Rebecca's eye focused on nothing while she drummed her fingers on her desk. Chief Director Costa-Brown had so much still to do, so much work that had piled up while Alexandria was off in Los Angeles, but despite the files sitting in front of her, her attention strayed again and again to the puzzle that had rooted itself firmly in her head.
The window opened, and she glanced over in surprise. Thankfully for her visitor, she held back from immediately lashing out. "I thought I told you to call ahead if you were coming here."
"Perhaps I just like surprising you."
"Most people who surprise me wind up getting thrown through a wall," she reminded the blue-suited cape. "Generally more than one."
"If you figure out how to hurt light, I might even let you," replied Legend with a laugh. "Not that you're the only one surprised. You're normally much more careful with keeping the connection between your identities separate, but right now, you aren't even trying to hide it. Is something the matter?"
She reached up to touch the plain eyepatch cover her empty left socket. "Everyone already knows I always have a lot of paperwork to catch up on and that they aren't to disturb me on Sundays for anything less that the literal end of the world. Not that anyone would want to talk," she added with a small, bitter smile. Sundays were peaceful around the head office of the PRT, in large part because no one with any sense wanted to come in to work on the weekend. It was one of the reasons she liked doing this: with the building staffed by a skeleton crew, no one came by to bother her as she worked through the report that constantly accumulated.
Well, that and the fact that her office was more familiar and inviting than her empty apartment. Free weekends meant little when she was the only one around.
Her memory and conscience joined forces to prod her at that thought. True, she did not have to be alone this weekend. Her parents had called with a special invitation to come to dinner the previous night and wish her baby sister luck on her fourth attempt at wedded bliss. A wish that would have been wasted considering Michelle's atrocious taste in men. Rebecca knew he was yet another brainless, aimless gym rat even before the background check. Not that she would have been welcome, anyway. One of the downsides of perfect memory and the ability to read micro-expressions was that the veiled distaste her siblings and siblings-in-law held for her might as well have been shouted in her face. It had made Thanksgiving five years previous incredibly awkward, enough that it was actually the last family event she had attended.
"And that ties into your eyepatch how?" he prodded.
She sighed and looked down at the small box sitting on one corner of the desk in which her glass eye rested. It was a necessary evil to keep her dual roles separate, yet that knowledge strangely did nothing to change the fact that indestructibility and surgical implants did not mix. Tinkertech might be a nice alternative, but it also required maintenance and posed a high risk for somebody outside the Triumvirate discovering the truth. Instead, she had to make do with the awkward solution she had eventually worked out, no matter how barbaric it seemed at times. "The clips broke sometime during my fight with Juggernaut. I haven't had a chance to replace them, and I can't go around with one eye hanging out."
"Ah," he said with a nod, no more eager to hear the details of its design than he had been when she first figured it out. "That would explain things."
"Explain things?"
He rolled his shoulders in a languid shrug. "Rime called me. She was worried that you've been a little… off lately. Not in a bad way," he added hastily, "but more like you're preoccupied. She was hoping I could figure out what's wrong."
"Rime worries too much." He smiled at her flat tone, unaware that she was not joking in the slightest. If she had realized how much of a mother hen Rime would turn into upon promotion to her second-in-command, she seriously would have considered someone else. Unfortunately – or, more likely, fortunately – Rime was also very good at her job, so she had no grounds upon which to demote her.
"Maybe, but you do seem a little stressed." Pulling off his mask, Michael sat in the chair in front of her desk. "You know you can tell me and David anything, right? If you need help, all you have to do is ask."
The words 'I'm fine' settled with familiar weight on her tongue, but she hesitated at the last second. No, she did not need any help of the variety he intended, but maybe he could provide something more useful. "Do you have time to be a sounding board? There's something I'd like a second opinion about."
He blinked, surprise written across his face in bold lettering. "Of course," he replied, his voice far more eager than she ever would have expected. Was he truly that excited to help? Or was it more that he had offered his help time and time again only to be rebuffed and so was overjoyed that she was finally accepting? "What's up?"
"I recently received a rather interesting report from Philadelphia. Dragon was discussing something with Calamity Witch, the same Tinker who sent us the document regarding the Simurgh's telepathy, and set up an appointment for Calamity Witch to get an MRI of her brain. From what I can read between the lines, there was some debate over whether or not her powers were actually magic."
Michael let out a long, drawn-out sigh. "Another Myrddin, huh? I like the guy, I really do, and maybe his powers really do require him to meditate and carve on his staff, but I have to deal with all the complaints that get sent in about his eccentricities. Did this newbie finally get convinced she sounded crazy?"
She raised her eyebrows and pushed the stack of papers away. There was no way she was going to get through this right now. "The relevant portion of the MRI makes for interesting reading. 'Also noted is a spherical lobule approximately 2 centimeters in diameter located between the frontal lobes on the superior aspect. This area is similar to other instances of the corona pollentia and has a higher than expected attenuation. No findings of the gemma lobe found in active parahumans. Bilateral tracts mirroring the course of the corona radiata show similar features. Low fMRI readings in setting of hyperattenuation indicates sclerosis as opposed to inflammatory process, but clinical correlation is recommended.' "
"And for those of us who didn't go to medical school and can't memorize textbooks at a glance?" he asked in an amused voice.
"It means she had a corona and possibly could have triggered. Had," she stressed. "Now it's scarred down. Without a gemma, she didn't trigger, and now she likely never can."
"But how can she be a Tinker if she didn't—" He caught on quickly enough and frowned. "Someone following in Saint's footsteps and stealing Tinkertech? Except Saint was one of Teacher's thralls; that's likely the reason he can use and modify Dragon's designs. Without a Tinker or Thinker power, someone would have needed to teach her how to use her weapons."
"And that someone would most likely be its creator. My thoughts exactly. But let's look at the powers themselves. Flight, pyrokinesis, corrosion projectiles, protective forcefields, and enhanced durability that in hindsight is more likely a second forcefield. A more recent report adds both a spatial warping power and a temporal warping power. And we can't forget the most impressive talent, rendering herself immune to the Simurgh. This would be incredible coming from someone who had to carry half a dozen massive devices with them." Rebecca gave him a tight smile. "All Calamity Witch has is a mechanical staff."
"Armsmaster could do something like that," Michael pointed out.
"Putting all those inventions into a single package? Agreed. What he could not do, though, is design everything else. Miniaturization grants understanding of neither energy manipulation nor spatiotemporal shenanigans. It would take a Tinker with a power lightyears beyond either Dragon or Hero to have even a slim hope of success."
A sigh preceded his nod of agreement. "Then it wasn't one Tinker. There were three, all working in collaboration."
"Five. Maybe six."
"How do you figure that?"
"Three like you said. A fourth who designed whatever protects her from the Scream. Maybe a fifth who destroyed her corona provided number four couldn't. And finally the bio-Tinker who created her bodyguard."
He blinked in confusion. "Bodyguard?"
"Officially a Case 53, raccoon-changer with multiple powers. Close range combatant. The only problem is she isn't one of ours. I know every 53 we ever made: their appearances, their powers, everything. We never made one who looked like her." She leaned back in her chair. "And most damning of all, she has the same immunity Calamity Witch has. I have a hard time believing two independent Tinkers stumbled onto something as valuable as this independently."
"There's just one problem with your theory," he told her. That comment received a curious look. Had he reached the same conclusion she had? She hoped not; that would get her nowhere. "Let's assume you're right. Six Tinkers, two of them with truly incredible powers and none of them anybody we've ever heard of, got together and collaborated to make a generator of some kind that would as good as turn anybody into a cape. They find somebody, scramble her corona, give her said generator and this bodyguard, and spend time teaching her how to use it.
"My question is simple. Why? What do they get out of it? She's an independent hero, right?" Rebecca nodded. "So it isn't that they're villains. If they were, she'd be committing crimes. If they're heroes or want to be heroes, they would have at least spoken to somebody with the Protectorate long before they found each other. If they're rogues and are trying to advertise their products, they wouldn't let her run around claiming she has powers of her own, and especially not that she's using magic of all things. Come to think of it, they wouldn't make just one," he added, rubbing his chin in thought. "After all the effort to design something like that, making more than one would be comparatively easy and would also give them more exposure. No matter how you look at this, none of it makes any sense."
"Yes, I'm aware," she grunted. "Why do you think it's been on my mind so much? I can't figure it out, and I keep coming to that conclusion, too. There is no way that series of events can come to pass, but I can't think of any other explanation."
"I can."
She looked up at his mirthful expression. He had another explanation? "What is it?"
"You're overthinking it. Just because we were part of a shadowy conspiracy doesn't mean there's one around every corner. We're missing some crucial piece of the puzzle, that's all." Tilting his head, he considered her thoughtfully. "What I find more interesting is how invested in this you are. I've never known you to get this riled up about any cape before. Any person before, honestly. What is it about her that has you so fixated?"
Because she's me from twenty years ago and looked at the me of today in disgust. Not that she could really explain that, not in any way that would make sense to him. Some days, it did not even make sense to her. All she knew for sure was that after the uncomfortable revelations following the Simurgh fight, she could not go back to how she had previously done things. In a way, it was almost a relief; the methods she had previously chosen were all geared towards a goal that was no longer possible or relevant, so being forced to abandon them provided the clean break she had not realized she needed. For every bit of relief, however, there was three times as much anxiety about what she was going to do now. The Endbringers might not be quite as threatening as Scion, but they still had no clue how to defeat the monstrosities.
Not to mention, they could no longer just let the world spiral into chaos and start over with whatever pieces were left. They were stuck with this mess.
"Unless…." He chuckled. "If you're that interested in her, you could just ask her out like a normal person."
…What?
"What."
"I mean, researching your crush inside and out until you know her better than she knows herself is definitely something you would do, but it's also a little creepy. You'll come off as less of a stalker if you actually talk to her."
With Herculean effort, she cast off the sheer befuddlement his words had caused and noticed the wide smile he was doing his best to hide. That… that…. "I know there is a way to hurt a rainbow," she hissed through her teeth, "and no matter how long it takes, mark my words. I will find it."
Michael finally let out the laugh he was holding back. "I'd say I'm sorry, but I'm not. That opportunity was just too good to pass up. And you have to admit, it isn't like anyone has any clue what tickles your fancy. For all I know, overpowered coeds might actually be what turns you on."
"Keep talking, Michael. I dare you."
All he did was grin, and soon enough she let the forced indignation fade away. "Not that it's any of your business, but I've always been too busy. Between D.C., L.A., and Cauldron, I didn't have the time to care for a cat, let alone a boyfriend. My cacti are about as much commitment as I can handle."
"I wish I found that harder to believe. I really do." Rolling her eyes, she pulled the paperwork towards her again in clear dismissal, not that he seemed to notice or care. "Don't take this the wrong way, but have you considered retiring?"
"What are you talking about?"
"When we started this project, there were two main reasons you wanted to be the one directing the non-cape side of things. One, integrating capes into the rest of society. I think that's been a success. It hasn't always been easy, and it's still not finished, but momentum is on our side. That's practically a done deal, and it doesn't need your personal attention anymore. Two, creating a foundation on which to rebuild society after Scion. Now that he's dead, it's irrelevant." He stared at her until she met his eyes. "You run yourself ragged taking care of two positions and leave no time for anything outside of it. Eidolon did the same, but we both know he half-wanted to die a heroic death while striking the killing blow against Scion. The big difference between you and him? He isn't unaging and indestructible. Eternity's a long time to spend all by yourself."
"If that was supposed to encourage me to focus on being Alexandria so I could have a life outside of work, it failed spectacularly."
He grimaced and pulled on his mask, Legend once more. "You're right. Forget I said anything."
"Easier said than done."
"Fair enough." Walking over, he laid his hand on her shoulder. "I don't mean to upset you. I just worry about you. Sometimes it's hard to reconcile how you are today with the bright-eyed girl you were when we all first met. We've all gotten older and wiser, but there were days…."
"There were days what?" He shook his head, but before he could deny anything, she pressed, "No, finish what you were going to say. There were days what?"
He looked away. "…There were days I worried your warmth and humanity wasn't protected from the ravages of time the same way your body is. That the reason you got better at making hard decisions wasn't because the world was becoming a harder place but because it was you becoming harder and colder. Finding out the truth about Cauldron didn't help matters."
As much as his words hurt, she could not refute them. Instead she reached over to lay her hand on top of his. "Maybe I was. That's part of why Calamity Witch interests me. She reminds me too much of myself from back then, and looking at us now, maybe I have lost something important. Something I don't know if I can ever get back," she finished in a whisper.
"I don't know about that," he replied. "You seem to be regaining some of it. Even a year ago, there's no way you would have trusted me with this. We haven't really trusted each other in a long while."
She gave his hand a pat and pulled away. "Well, that's something we can try to fix. Not today," she added with a glare at her work, "but soon. Grab Eidolon and spend some time together without fights or dark revelations. Just the three of us like we used to be."
"You have no idea how much I like that idea."
No, she did. Watching him slip out the window again through the corner of her eye, she returned to her reports. She really did.
My depiction of Alexandria's prosthetic eye is different from canon, but that's because 1) it probably isn't Tinkertech for the reason stated above, 2) the mounting Wildbow described isn't used in real life, at least not for an eye that's supposed to be mobile, and 3) his method would have required surgery, which you can't do on someone who is completely invulnerable.
